Yale graduation is May 23. Just around the corner. After that, there are no limits. She dreams of becoming a talk show host or a famous writer. Almost anything seems possible. But something deeper tugs, and so she has decided to come home after graduation and teach on the city’s West Side.

Through Teach for America, Bethel has accepted a job at the LEARN charter school in North Lawndale. “I want to be that one person who says, ‘I believe in you,” she explains.